On Tuesday, we hosted the UHV President’s Annual Report & Excellence Awards event during which we celebrated accomplishments of the past year and awarded a number of important recognitions. I would encourage you to visit the website for this program at uhvannualreport.com. You can view the videos presented that night, including video recordings of the program itself. It was a great event and an inspiring night for me as I listened to all the great things that have happened at UHV during the last year, in spite of a rocky start because of Hurricane Harvey. This is a great university, and we are doing great things for our students and our region.

During the event, we gave out four important awards. The first award was the Student Leadership Award, which is intended to recognize an exceptional student for his or her accomplishments at UHV. This year, the award went to Alvaro De La Cruz. Alvaro is a senior biology major from Converse who plans to attend medical school after graduation. He was president of the Student Government Association last year in addition to being active in several student organizations. Additionally, he continues in his role as a senior resident assistant by training new staff while he takes care of his residents. 

The next award was the Community Partnership Award, which was presented to the Rebuild Texas Fund. The Rebuild Texas Fund provided UHV with a $100,000 grant to aid students after Hurricane Harvey. More than 200 UHV students have received funds so far through the UHV Relief Fund and probably could not have persisted without that support. The award recognizes not only the grant to UHV, but also the more than $50 million the Rebuild Texas Fund has invested across the Coastal Bend region.

The third award, the People Who Make a Difference Award, was given to the Bennett-Wood Family in recognition of its 65-acre gift of land near the Victoria Regional Airport that eventually will house the university’s athletic facilities. At the time, the gift, valued at more than $800,000, was the second-largest single gift in the history of the institution. The Bennett-Wood Family has a long history of supporting education in Victoria, and this gift was made 100 years after William Wood made a gift of land to the city, on which an elementary school bearing his name now stands. This gift will be a game changer for our student-athletes and the athletics program.

The final award of the evening was the Presidential Medal. This award is the highest recognition awarded by the university to an individual for exceptional service to the university and the community. The recipient has defined service to the community and to higher education, having served as a regent for the University of Houston System, in addition to a wide variety of boards in the community. Victoria resident Roger Welder clearly epitomizes the definition of public service and spirit.

In each and every case, the recipients of these awards were humbled by the honor and did not think of themselves as having done anything exceptional but rather were simply doing what they should as a member of the community. Each one of these recipients demonstrates that greatness always resides in a humble heart and always is there when we seek first to serve others. UHV truly is fortunate to have these men and women as a part of our community. I feel fortunate to be a part of the UHV community, and I hope you do as well.